Playing-cards.



E. F. ADAMS.

PLAYING CARDS.

7 APPLICATION FILED 1120.13, 1910 1,012,574. Patented Dec. 26, 1911.

WITNESSES: INVENTOR.

d! :2 4144 43am T'TORNEY.

EMMA F. ADAMS, OF SPRINGFIELD, MISSOURI.

PLAYING-CARDS.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Dec. 26, 1911.

Application filed December 18, 1910. Serial No. 587,133.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, EMMA F. ADAMS, a citizen of the United States,residing at Springfield, in the county of Greene and State of Missouri,have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Playing- Cards, ofwhich the following is a specification.

My invention relates to improvements in playing cards.

The object of my invention is to rovide a pack of playing cards withwhich instructive and amusing games may be played.

In the accompanying drawings illustrative of the preferred form of myinvention Figures 1 to 6 inclusive represent respectively some of thecards of the pack.

Similar reference characters denote similar parts.

In the preferred form of my invention 'fifty three cards are employed toform a pack. Fifty two of the cards have inscribed thereon characterswhich represent the usual four suits of thirteen cards each, each suitcomprising a king, a queen, a knavc or jack and ten s )ot cards. Thevalue of each oi these car s and the suit to which it belongs may bedesignated in the usual manner by characters placed near the upper leftand lower right hand corners of each card. Thus Figs. 1 to 5 inclusivere n'esent respectivel the jack of clubs, the jack of spades, t 0 sevenof clubs, the ace of hearts and the jack of diamonds, the value and suitcharacters being denoted respectively by 1 and 2. The other card of thepack, shown in Fig. 6 is the joker card. This may be a blank card, asshown, or it may have inscribed on it any suitable character fordenoting the value of the card. Each card, excepting the joker card,bears upon it, in addition to the characters 1 and 2 which denote thevalue and suit of the card a letter of the alphabet. Preferably all ofthe letters of the alphabet are represented on twenty six of the cardsres ectlvely the letters of the remaining car s provided with lettershaving letters which are duplicates of some of the twenty six cards111st referred to. The duplicate letters are preferably vowels andconsonants which are most used. The letters preferably occu y thecenters of the cards and are denoted m the drawings by 3. Preferablysome of the letters are of one color and the other letters are ofanother color. For example the lettcrs 3 of the cards shown in Figs. 1,2 and 3 are black, while those shown in Figs. 4 and 5 are red. Inplaying a game the person having the greatest number of cards with blackletters may count for himself one point, or this may be reversed and theperson having taken the greatest number of red letters may count 1point, or more, as the rules may determine.

In playin with the cards various rules for playing iifi'erent ames maybe adopted. For example the car s may be played as in the game ofcasino. Any player may take one or more cards from t e pool by playingto the pool a card bearing a letter which with the letter or letters ofa card .or cards in the pool will spell a word. Or a player may build,as in casino, by playing upon a card which is in the pool a card fromhis hand which with the card in the pool and with the letter of anothercard which he must hold in his hand will spell a word. Thus, say that Cis in the pool, or on the board, and a player holds A and T, and it ishis time to play, he can build the card A on the card C which is in thepool, and then, when his turn to play comes again he can play the T cardand take the three cards C, A and T, because these three letters asplayed spell the word cat. Another player, however, following the playof the card A upon the card C and holding the card having the letter Pcould take the cards C and A, which have been built by the previousplay, by playing thereon the card P. The joker card, shown in Fig. 6,can represent any letter, so that the player holding it may employ it inconnection with any letter or letters on the board to complete any wordwhich can be completed with any letter combined with those on the board.Or the letters denoted by 3 may be employed in connection with thecharacters 1 an 2 in an desired manner. Thus in counting points afterthe game has been played as above described, the holder of the mostspades may count a point, as may the holder of little casino, and theholder of big casino, the ten 0i diamonds, may count two points. Theaces may each count one for game. Thus in laying and building thecareful pla er W11 endeavor to make plays which wil score him the mostdpoints, and, therefore, when playing car s to make words, will try totake cards such as big and httle casino and the aces. For example,assuming that the cards C, A and T are on the board, a player holdingthe ace of hearts, bearing the letter O and the ten of diamonds, bearingsay the letter S, should play the ten of diamonds with the letter Smaking with the letters C A and '1 on the board, the word cats. He wouldthus secure big casino in addition to the trick, thereby counting onemore than he would have counted if he had played the ace of hearts withthe letter O to complete the word Cato From the above description itwill be obvious that with an ordinary pack ofplaying cards provided withthe letters of the alphabet as above described, many instructive andamusing games may be played in accordance with any desired set of rules.

Modifications of my invention, within the scope of the appended claims,may be made without departing from its spirit.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim and desire to secure byLetters Patcut, is

1. In a pack of playing cards, cards having characters representing foursuits of thirteen cards each, each suit comprising a king, a queen, ajack, and ten spot cards, each of said cards having inscribed thereon,in addition to the character or characters representing the suit, aletter of the alphabet, said letters including vowels and consonants.

2. In a pack of playing cards, card and cards having charactersrepresenting four suits of thirteen cards each, each suit comprising aking, a queen, a jack and ten spot cards, each of the suit cards havinginscribed thereon, in addition to the character or charactersrepresenting the suit, a letter of the alphabet, said letters includingvowels and consonants, and the joker card being adapted to represent anyletter or suit character.

In testimony whereof I have signed my name to this s ecification inpresence of two subscribing witnesses.

EMMA F. ADAMS.

a joker Witnesses:

JEROME OHARA, W. H. IIENDERSON.

